[TrickyDick]

I worked for a car parts reseller that said, in their quarterly meetings we were forced to attend, the 'miles driven' indicator was the main predictor for their business. It had started going sideways by the time I joined the company, but they were optimistic about it turning up soon and reaching new highs like it used to effortlessly do.

Here's an article with some interesting analysis by a financial guru type. He adds in the population deflator and recalculates the indicator. Curiously enough, when adjusted for population it PEAKED IN 2005!! Here's the link:

http://www.advisorperspectives.com/dshort/updates/DOT-Miles-Driven.php

Lots of cool graphs in the article, but as gifs, they don't want to post for me here.

[ROCKMAN]

Dick - "Curiously enough, when adjusted for population it PEAKED IN 2005!!" Does that really surprise you or were you just teasing? Adjusted for inflation gasoline prices held more or less flat at $1.75 - $2 per gallon for about 20 years. And then at the beginning of 2005 prices quickly shot up to over $3/gallon. The last time prices reached this level (again adjusted for inflation) was 33 years ago in 1981 when the Iran/Iraq war began.

[TrickyDick]

I meant that it is an interesting confirmation of the supposed 2005 crude production peak. It highlights a couple of the ingredients that keep the production plateau going: people are cutting back on usage and the indicators that people need to understand the situation aren't coming from the government (they have to be created by non-official means, so it gives aid to the PO deniers that the 'real' indicator doesn't look so bad, just a regular recession, move along).